


Snow Blurs Brooklyn

by rainandcoffee



Category: Vampire Chronicles - Anne Rice
Genre: Blood Drinking, Happy Ending, M/M, Modern Era, Vampire Daniel, armand/daniel - Freeform, canon compliant up to like blackwood farm or something, daniel molloy - Freeform, daniel/armand - Freeform, i sort of checked out after that, plot what's plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 14:49:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29403657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainandcoffee/pseuds/rainandcoffee
Summary: As snow pummels Brooklyn, Daniel sends a random photo to Armand, who then appears because he doesn't know how to text back, I guess.
Relationships: Armand/Daniel Molloy
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21





	Snow Blurs Brooklyn

**Author's Note:**

> Not my vampires, not my characters, not my circus, no profit being made, yadda yadda yadda. Sometimes you just can't get a thought out of your head, so that's how this fic happened. I just like these assholes having some happiness, you know?

Snow blanketed the streets of New York, covering everything in white. The sky was pink with more impending snow and icy air swirled around Daniel as he tromped down the street. Others had cut a trail but he preferred to walk in the undisturbed snow. He liked the sound it made. 

He emerged from the alley and saw several people on the street despite the late hour. It was past midnight but a man dragged groceries behind him on a sled and several drunk folks were having a snow ball fight. 

The snow seemed to dampen the cacophony of the city and soften the world. As he turned a corner and spotted the Brooklyn Bridge, he froze. Swallowed. Pushed back memories. 

He was trying not to get lost in sentimentality and nostalgia. Sentimentality had quite literally driven him mad—well, that and grief—and now that he’d come back to himself, he was wary of any trail that might lead him that way again. 

Not that being mad had been all bad. He’d built miniature cities and worlds and let reality fray around him. He’d obsessed over tiny trains and their routes and the number of minuscule trees they would pass on their journeys to and from small villages he crafted by hand. 

Sometimes, he missed being mad. 

Except there had always been this nagging, tugging darkness at the edges of it. Reality trying to break through. Grief and horror and misery so large it might swallow him whole if he let it. So he hadn’t. 

Now, though, reality was not so bad. The world at large was a mess, of course, but that was nothing new. It was just a different mess. The beauty of immortality was getting to live to see how the world adapted and changed as new problems arose. 

Still, the sight of the bridge in the snow brought back images from decades before, back when he’d been a human in love with the devil and determined to become a devil himself. 

He pulled out his cell phone and stared at the dark screen. No calls, no texts. Well, no surprise there. Vampires sucked at modern communication. There was a Coven text chain but the last message was almost nine months old. It was mostly Jesse and a few of the younger vampires who used it, and only rarely. 

He swiped the screen and opened the photo app. He took several shots of the bridge. He put the phone back in his pocket. 

His veins burned with the need for blood. He needed to go find some evil bastard to quench his thirst. He turned away, stopped, and pulled the phone back out.

He pulled up his contacts. Armand’s name was at the top four times. Different numbers. He didn’t know for sure which was the most recent, but took his best guess and sent one of the photos.

Then he put the phone away. 

He didn’t really expect a response. 

***

Two nights later, Daniel moved through the streets of Brooklyn like a ghost. That was the appeal of big cities. No one knew him and frankly, no one really cared to. He was a creature of the night. A predator watching and waiting for the chance to strike. 

But sometimes he wanted to reach out, grab someone, and have a damned conversation. A year or so ago, he’d have sat in a bar, striking up conversations with whatever bored drunkards were there. But now, with the bars closing early and the snowfall and the pandemic, people were largely staying inside. 

Wasn’t it Lestat who’d written about a great loneliness at work in these times? And that had been what, twenty, thirty years ago? It felt worse now. Perhaps because Daniel was older, or maybe because the world was smaller and larger all at once. He carried in his pocket an internet with windows to the entire planet, and a list of contacts as long as his arm, and yet. 

He could reach out, but why? What did he have to say? “Hey, Lestat, staying out of trouble?” “What up, Louis, how are your sweaters holding up? Keeping the moths at bay?” How absurd. They’d come together again at some point. They always did. Until then, there was no real point. 

He bit his tongue with his fangs and let a little blood bead into his mouth. He rolled the coppery liquid on his tongue and swallowed. 

He heard snow crunch behind and turned, ready to bare his fangs and scare the shit out of whoever had the bad luck to cross his path. Instead, no one was there. He frowned. 

Someone laughed and he spun. There was a woman walking a dog up the street and she had a phone to her ear. He sighed. 

He felt a slight tug on his veins. He was hungry, but not starving. Not yet. He had figured out he could hunt every four or five days and be fine. But he had to be careful. If he let it go too long, sometimes the edges of reality began to blur again. 

Years ago, Marius had made Daniel check in every couple of days, a practice Armand had scoffed at. One night, Marius and Armand had fought about it over the phone, Daniel seated on the couch interjecting while watching Armand furiously pace and yell into the phone until nearly sunrise. He smiled at the memory of it. Daniel hadn’t minded the precaution, though he agreed it was a silly. He wasn’t a child.

 _Just a previously insane vampire whose grip on reality might be tenuous._ But then, who the hell wasn’t? 

Daniel headed up the street back to his brick townhouse. It was wedged in the center of five identical homes with a brick facade. They—he and Armand—owned the entire set, but rented the rest out for far below market price. Daniel had taken up residence in the one empty home about three months prior, after spending a year bouncing around without purpose. 

He paused on the sidewalk. There was a set of footsteps going up the walk in the fresh snow. His own footsteps leaving had been covered by a thin dusting but these others… His dead heart beat faster. 

He didn’t dare to hope.

He opened the front door and peered inside, up the stairwell, as if a bomb might go off if he crossed the threshold. He held his breath and listened. No sound.  
His heart sank. Of course not. 

Probably just some lost delivery person who’d gone up the stoop and left using the same footholds. He stepped inside and shrugged off his coat, hanging it up by the door, which he secured with three locks. 

Upstairs, the air was still but there was a scent. The faint whisper of cologne put on nights before and a smattering of iron-rich blood. Daniel smiled. He turned and saw the figure sitting motionless in the easy chair in the dark, like a statue that had been planted there.

“Armand.” 

The statue’s eyes flicked to Daniel but he didn’t move otherwise. Infuriating, really. 

“What are you doing here?” 

“I got your message,” Armand said plainly. Daniel stepped closer. In the dark with his vampire vision he could see Armand wore a tailored suit, charcoal colored, and blue satin shirt. No tie and the collar was open. Daniel’s gaze hesitated there, on his pale throat. His auburn hair was long again, falling to his shoulders. He hadn’t bothered to cut it tonight, like he usually did these days. 

“Message?” Daniel remembered the photo of the Brooklyn Bridge. 

“Did you not want me to come?” The timber of his voice so familiar it sang to Daniel’s veins. He met Daniel’s eyes. 

“It wasn’t a goddamn bat signal. It was just a photo.” He remained planted across the room, as if moving toward Armand might make him flee. Ridiculous, of course. But that was always how it felt at first, every time they came back together. Like a fragile thing that could shatter at any second. 

“I see.” 

Daniel rolled his eyes. “Where were you?” 

“Budapest.” 

“What’s in Budapest?” he asked. Who, he wondered. Not out of jealousy, not really, just curiosity. Daniel had spent the past year and a half alone, and he’d often wondered if Armand was doing the same or if he’d yet again found companionship. Despite his standoffishness, people often flocked around Armand. He had been the enigmatic leader of the Theatre Des Vampires, after all, and it wouldn’t surprise Daniel to learn he’d started some new vampiric cult or group. 

He waited for a retort to that thought but then remembered that Armand could no longer hear his thoughts. It had been decades and he still sometimes forgot.

Armand was staring at him intently, as if he too had forgotten and was trying to figure out what filled Daniel’s mind in the silence. 

Finally, he said, “I was in Budapest because my travels took me there. Why are you here?” 

Daniel leaned against the doorway that led to the small kitchen, still not daring to get close. He shrugged. “Miami feels too chaotic right now.” 

Armand nodded, as though he understood. Daniel wondered how many times he, too, headed back there only to decide it no longer felt like home.

Armand stood. “Well, if you have no need of me, I’ll be going.” 

“Don’t be an asshole,” Daniel said. This time he dared step closer, closing the distance until only a few feet remained between them. Armand’s skin was pink with blood. That was where the aroma came from. He’d just fed. 

They stared at each other for a long moment. Daniel tried to remember when he’d last seen his maker. In Paris? No. They’d gone to Madrid after that, and spent a solid month. He couldn’t remember why they’d parted ways. A fight, probably, no doubt over something stupid. Eventually, they always drove each other to the brink of patience. 

“Did you wish me to come here or not?” Armand pressed.

Daniel sighed heavily. This was where he was supposed to make some snarky comment and they’d argue. Instead, he said, “Yes.” 

Armand’s expression turned faintly smug. He’d won that round. That was fine. It meant there would be another. 

He tilted his head slightly, looking Daniel over. “You look well.” 

Daniel shrugged. “As well as your friendly, insane neighborhood vampire can look.” 

“You’re not mad, Daniel.” His words were forceful. 

Daniel stepped closer, so they were only inches apart. He resisted the urge to reach out. He could feel the heat radiating off Armand. Smell the verbena shampoo in his hair and the copper on this tongue. “I suppose we could have a long discussion about the nature of sanity and how it’s all relative.” 

“Must we?” 

Daniel smirked. “No. What do you want to talk about?” 

Armand’s hand flew out, lightning fast, and grabbed Daniel’s shoulder. He laughed. It no longer felt so alien when Armand did things like that but it still amused him. Armand trailed a finger down Daniel’s t-shirt, which was threadbare with a hole at the collar. It advertised a band Daniel had heard in bar once years ago, and he’d bought it because he liked the blue and gray design of the dragon on the front. “You still dress like a homeless vagrant.” 

Daniel snorted. “I considered getting a cape but the whole Dracula thing is too 1990s.” 

Armand smiled, finally. Took the bastard long enough. 

Daniel reached up and stroked his cheek. It burned with the blood pulsing inside him and Daniel’s hand tingled. 

_I missed you._

He didn’t dare say it. That wasn’t how this worked. They would dance around those admissions of love and affection for at least a week. 

God, he hoped this time it lasted for at least a week. 

He dropped his hand to Armand’s suit jacket and tugged at the lapel. “You, though, still rocking the Armani, huh? Does Lestat get us a Coven discount or something?”

Armand gave him a hard look. Then he dropped his hand from Daniel’s shoulder and grabbed Daniel’s wrist. His fingers tightened against his weak pulse and brought the wrist to his lips. Daniel waited for pain, for fangs to tear open his flesh, but instead Armand only grazed his lips over the soft skin and let the arm drop. 

Daniel met Armand’s brown eyes, refusing to look at his throat. Armand stared back, unblinking. Daniel swallowed. 

Armand titled his head in question. Daniel didn’t move. He just wanted to stare at him for a moment, to appreciate having him there when it had been what, almost two years? God, how they did let time slip away? And yet that was how this dance went, wasn’t it? A year together, two years apart… over and over. Maybe until the end of time. 

At least they still had until the end of time. 

Armand’s eyes flicked to Daniel’s neck but then met his eyes again. He frowned. Armand lifted his hand, which bore a ring with a sharpened point. He swiped it across his own throat, cutting it open an inch or so. Blood beaded across the line. 

The aroma of it was overwhelming. Daniel grabbed him and pressed his mouth to the line, licking the warm blood from his cool skin. He pressed his mouth to the wound and drank, blood filling his mouth with the taste of copper and heat. Electricity shot through his veins. 

Armand moaned and Daniel tightened his hold, letting the blood wash over him. Images of churches and museums filled his mind, places in Budapest, he thought. And there was something else in the blood, a desire and need that sang to Daniel as it burned through him. 

A gentle hand eased Daniel back and he fought against it, not wanting to lose this connection, not wanting the flow of blood to stop. But Armand pulled out of his grasp anyhow. 

“Armand,” Daniel said. The world spun. He reached for him again. Wanted him back. Needed him back. 

Armand reached up and stroked Daniel’s cheek, fingers smooth against his skin. Then he pressed his lips to Daniel’s and he lost himself in the kiss instead, fingers threading through Armand’s hair. A fang tore his lip and blood filled their mouths. When they finally broke apart, Daniel was breathless. 

He didn’t want to stop kissing and touching him, didn’t want him to walk out the door and be gone for another interminable amount of time. 

They stared at each other for a long moment. Then Armand stepped back and looked around the room, at the worn sofa and fraying rug. The place was spartan, with only the bits of furniture the previous tenant had left behind except for the bed upstairs, which Daniel had actually purchased. He hadn’t bothered to do anything else.

“I missed New York,” Armand said. “Though this place could use a new coat of paint. Perhaps some new flooring.” 

Daniel shook his head. “Hey, how about you wait a week before you start some massive remodel, hm?”

“I’m not going to live in a hovel just because you have no sense of style.” He stepped past Daniel and through the archway to examine the decrepit kitchen. Daniel hadn’t so much as set foot in there since he’d moved in. “You and Louis. The two of you could exist in a series of dusty, moldy rooms for a century like ghosts.” 

Daniel smirked. “That’s where you’re wrong. I had plans to gut this place and upgrade it. Eventually.” The problem was, once Daniel got started on those types of projects, he struggled to do anything else. There was a risk he’d lose himself in painting the walls or placing tiles and forget to feed. And then… Well, it was a slippery slope.

Armand watched him, keenly aware of Daniel’s thoughts, even without being able to read them. 

He touched Daniel’s arm, and let his hand remain there, cool fingers making his skin tingle. “It won’t take much. A few months, tops.” 

Daniel felt the turmoil inside him quiet, relief washing over him. Armand was here and he was going to stay. He wouldn’t vanish like vapor into the night. Not yet. 

“If you say so. Just so long as I get a say on the wallpaper. Last time I let you pick, I had to live that with that hideous green mess.” 

“It was ‘wild fern’ and it matched the drapes.” 

“Which were also hideous.” 

“Don’t start, Daniel.”

Daniel smirked. “Who says I ever stopped?”


End file.
